NHS Scotland junior doctor strike: What is a junior doctor? How much do junior doctors gets paid? When are the strikes?

Here's what you need to know about Scotland’s junior doctors’ planned strike action and pay dispute with the Scottish Government.

What is a junior doctor?

Don’t let the ‘junior’ title fool you – junior doctors are qualified doctors with a medical degree and foundation training, who are still taking part in clinical training.

Junior doctors hold placards on a picket line. Picture: AFP via Getty Images

They have completed a medical degree and foundation training and, across their entire career, can have up to eight years' of working experience as a hospital doctor, depending on their specialty, or up to three years of working experience in general practice.

All junior doctors work under the supervisor of a senior doctor, but can sometimes be the most senior doctor on a ward in their specialty.

How much do junior doctors get paid?

It depends on where they are in their career. A first year junior doctor earns between £27,653 and £31,106 for 40 hours a week, plus pay for additional hours worked, weekend allowances and on-call allowances.

What is the dispute about?

Junior doctors were first offered a 4.5 per cent pay uplift by the Scottish Government, the same as last year, but the BMA – the union representing junior doctors – described this as “derisory”, saying pay erosion means a foundation doctor now earns 23.5 per cent less than they would have done in 2008.

The BMA’s junior doctor members then voted for a 72-hour walkout in what would be their first national strike over pay.

Following this, the Scottish Government offered junior doctors a 14.5 per cent pay rise over two years in an attempt to curb strike action. The Government said the offer represented a £61.3 million investment in junior doctor pay, and would constitute a 6.5 per cent pay increase in 2023/24, as well as a 7.5 per cent uplift in 2022/23.

The BMA then put the offer to its members in a consultative ballot. The results of the consultative vote saw 71.1 per cent vote to reject the offer on a turnout of 66.3 per cent.

When are the planned strike dates?

The leadership of BMA Scotland’s junior doctor committee has confirmed three days of strike action will take place on July 12-15 “unless an improved offer that the BMA believes could credibly be put to members is put forward by the Scottish Government”.

What impact will the planned strikes have?

During April’s four-day junior doctors strike in England, there were 195,000 cancellations.

At the peak of the action, there were 27,361 staff not at work due to industrial action. However, the workforce data collection was incomplete, so these figures are not the full picture.

In the previous junior doctors’ strike south of the border there were 175,000 cancellations across three days.

Scotland has around one tenth of the population of England, so there will be much less cancelled operations, but we can expect the impact to be proportionally the same.

Mr Matheson has previously said a junior doctors’ strike would cause “significant disruption” and has warned all 14 of Scotland’s regional health boards to draw up contingency plans for industrial action.

The cancelled operations will add to the huge backlog of procedures NHS Scotland is tackling.